KARACHI: Pakistan has started assembling Chinese passenger car -V2, a 1,300cc hatchback, which is now being produced in the country.

Al-Haj Faw Motors (Private) Limited, a collaboration between Faw China and a commercial importer of heavy vehicles Al-Haj Motors has started an assembly plant in Karachi to manufacture Chinese cars.

The company was earlier importing Completely Built Units (CBU) of V2 for the last two years to see market response but now has decided to produce the car locally after being satisfied with the response.

"We want to become the export base of Faw for export of cars to Southeast Asia and African markets," The Express Tribune quoted Al-Haj Faw Motors Managing Director Bilal Afridi said at a ceremony organised at the company plant.

The company initially targets to produce 300 units of V2 per month and then increase the production level to 500 units by the end of 2017. Currently, the company has over 600 workers and its annual capacity is 10,000 units (single shift) that will be increased to 15,000 units by 2020.

According to the report, the company has recently invested Rs1.3 billion to improve the assembly plant.

The current price of Faw V2 is Rs. 1.069 million to make it an attractive product and compete well with the Japanese competitors.

Company officials say their plans to produce Chinese passenger cars and light commercial vehicles (LCVs) locally got delayed as the government from 2013 to 2016 failed to announce a new auto policy interrupted the planned investments.